HE drove her back to Josh and Rachel’s house. On the way, Adora inquired about Shay.
“You were interested at first,” she pointed out. “Admit it.”
Of course he didn’t. But she knew better. Cupid Level One, in danger of losing her wings or not, Adora had an inborn sense about these things.
“She’s definitely interested in you. What happened?”
“You were spying on me?”
“Observing,” she corrected.
“Do you always observe without telling people you’re there?”
“No, but my assignments aren’t usually so opposed to having me around. Normally, I become quite friendly with them, and they actually like hanging out with me.”
“I like hanging out with you,” he insisted. “I’m just not interested in taking a mate. So if you wanna hang out without holding that over my head, I’m game.”
“That really does defeat the purpose, you know,” Adora replied, even though the idea of simply hanging out with Matt, with no other expectations, had a curiously intriguing appeal.
“Here’s a question. If your assignments are guys, how do you hook them up with other women if you’re always around? I mean, you’re pretty hot, so I would imagine most women wouldn’t want you to be hanging out with their potential mate.”
She preened. He thought she was hot. An image of him lying in bed, naked and half-asleep, popped into her head. Speaking of hot.
“It depends on the situation,” she replied. “Not all women are the jealous type.”
“Shifter women are.”
“Which means it was a good thing I didn’t make my presence known at your brother’s house,” she shot back.
Matt made a face. “Doesn’t matter. Shay’s not my type.”
“What is your type?”
“I don’t know that I have a specific type. I just know what I don’t like.”
“And what was it about her you didn’t like?”
“As soon as she found out I was first cousin to the pack master, all she saw was my status. She probably would have stripped naked right there in front of my nephews and brother if she thought she had half a chance of mating with me.”
“Bit of a pessimistic view of your species, don’t you think?”
“More like pragmatic. Trust me. I know the signs.”
The circle drive in front of Josh’s home was blocked by a white truck inscribed with the logo of the hotel Josh owned. He had apparently enlisted the hotel to cater the event he had planned for this evening.
Adora frowned, recalling the scene she’d watched from her perch, fluttering about the highest branches of the nearest tree. “I don’t think it was quite that bad. You should give her a chance.”
“No,” Matt said flatly. He parked behind the catering vehicle and climbed out of the truck.
Inside, the house was a flurry of activity. Hotel staff prepped colorful arrays of dishes that were heavy on meat ingredients. Adora noted appetizers made with duck and venison and beef, as well as pork and chicken and enough bacon to cause a heart attack in mere humans. Shifters, however, had different metabolisms, and their bodies actually needed the meat.
Bartenders stacked glasses and lined up bottles of top shelf liquor on makeshift bars set up in various rooms on the main level. Florists rushed from horizontal surface to horizontal surface, adding vases filled with bright, fresh-cut fall flowers. A small pack of teenaged shifters were being instructed to move furniture around to accommodate what was expected to be quite the crush.
Adora followed Matt through the barely controlled chaos, up a wide staircase with a shining wooden bannister, through a maze of halls, until they reached the pack master’s private suite. Several people were gathered there. Rachel, of course, as well as shifters, Lightbearers, and an infant who was a combination of the two. As soon as they walked into the sitting room, Josh stepped up and offered them each a drink, then began the introductions.
“Matt, you remember Tanner Lyons, his mate Olivia, and their pup, Austin?”
Matt shook hands with a shifter who wore his long dark hair pulled back into a ponytail. As with most shifters, he had thick facial hair, although it was neatly trimmed. A black V-neck sweater and a pair of black slacks complimented a smooth, powerful image that was gently negated by the dark-haired, blue-eyed baby bouncing in his hands and drooling onto his arm.
Tanner’s mate stood from where she had been sitting on a small sofa next to Rachel and walked over to shake hands with Matt and Adora. She was equally as elegant as Tanner, but as opposite in coloring as one could get, with white blond hair and pale, pale eyes. Her skin was palest alabaster, a stark contrast to Tanner’s olive, perpetually tanned skin. She wore a cream-colored velvet dress with long sleeves and a scooped neck that showed off the top swell of her breasts.
An older male Lightbearer with hair the same color as Olivia’s stood from where he had been seated in an overstuffed armchair, and Josh introduced him as the King of the Lightbearers.
“I’m Sander Bennett,” he said, shaking first Adora’s hand and then Matt’s. “Adoring grandfather and occasional figurehead.”
“You’re more than a figurehead, Father,” Olivia protested, but to Adora, it sounded weak, as though she didn’t believe her own words.
“Yes, well, Matt, why don’t you introduce your lovely companion,” the king suggested. “I think I know what she is, although I’ve never met one in person before.”
Josh beat him to the punch. “This is Adora Adone, Matt’s own personal Cupid.”
Sander nodded, a self-satisfied look on his face. “As I suspected.”
“We’ve never had reason to visit your coterie, as the Lightbearers have always had arranged unions,” Adora said.
The king glanced at his daughter. “Yes, well, I’m not so sure that will change anytime soon. We’ve eliminated arranged unions, but it seems these shifters keep coming along, convincing my Lightbearers to fall in love with them.”
He didn’t sound terribly unhappy about his observation. Adora looked at Matt through her lashes. Perhaps she needed to arrange for a visit to the coterie. Maybe he had been right when he suggested his mate might not be a shifter.
“Don’t even think about it,” he muttered out of the corner of his mouth, clearly guessing what she had been thinking.
“What’s a Cupid?” Tanner asked, eyeing her with undisguised curiosity.
Was it her imagination, or had Matt moved closer? When his arm brushed hers, she gave a start as if she’d been shocked by a jolt of electricity. Tanner arched his eyebrows but otherwise did not acknowledge the action.
“Matchmakers,” Sander explained. “Totally benign creatures, so they can travel freely from world to world, even if the portal or passageway has been blocked by magic. Which you would know if you read that book on magical species I loaned you.”
Tanner apparently chose to ignore the dig. “You mean like pups with wings that go around shooting bows and arrows? Do you have wings?”
Adora’s lips quirked. It seemed practically everyone had the same misconception about Cupids. “We don’t start matchmaking until we’ve completed five years of Cupid School, and most do not start Cupid School until they are fifteen. And we do not use bows and arrows anymore. Doesn’t exactly go along with our benign personalities, even if the arrows are tipped with love potions.”
“And yes, she has wings,” Matt added.
“Oh, can we see them?” Sander asked, clapping his hands like an eager child.
Adora was about to indulge him, when Matt placed his hand on her arm and said, “She’s not a goddamn specimen in a petri dish.”
Adora patted his hand and gave him an appreciative smile. “It’s really quite all right, Matt. I get this a lot. And I don’t mind in the least.”
To avoid further argument, she quickly sprouted her wings and fluttered them, drawing everyone’s attention, including Matt’s. It was flattering how much he appreciated her wings. Hopefully, that appreciation would help him come to the conclusion that he needed to take a mate. Otherwise, she would lose them forever.
“Josh said you’re Matt’s personal Cupid. What does that mean?” Tanner asked.
“It means I’ve been sent to help him find his mate.”
Tanner chuckled and slapped Matt on the back. “Congrats, bro.”
“Don’t congratulate me. I’m not taking a mate.” Matt all but spat the words and then swallowed the contents of the drink in his hand.
His stubbornness concerned Adora, and she wished she had his dossier, so she could learn what from his past had caused it. Her Assigner had insisted this would be an easy assignment, yet thus far, Matt had shown no signs of relaxing his determination to remain single.
Rachel distracted her from these thoughts by grabbing her arm and tugging her toward a nearby sofa. “Adora and I only met yesterday, yet I feel as though we’ve been friends forever,” she said, speaking to Olivia, who had followed them. She sat on Rachel’s other side and gave Adora another speculative look.
“I’m so glad Rachel has a friend right now. I understand the pack has not been overly welcoming,” Olivia said.
Rachel frowned and Adora clamored to find a subject that would not upset her new friend. “What about the coterie?” she asked. “Have the Lightbearers accepted the shifters who now live there?”
Olivia nodded. “For the most part, yes, although I won’t lie, it’s been a struggle. But as we were on the brink of bankruptcy when Tanner came along and were about to have to abandon the coterie to seek our way in the human world, I’d say having shifters around has significantly improved our lot in life.”
Rachel sighed. “If only I had something like that to bring to the table. All I do is somehow cause all the kids—er, pups—to like me. I even offered to start a shifter daycare, but only a few would even consider leaving their kids alone with me. The adults all still hate the fact that I’m part of their pack.”
“Not all of them,” Adora reassured her.
Thankfully, Olivia changed the subject. “Adora, I’ve read about Cupids, but like my father, I’ve never seen one until now. Are you really assigned matchmakers?”
“Yes, that’s exactly what we are.”
“And they really did use bows and arrows, once upon a time,” Rachel added, her melancholy replaced with amusement. “Tell her that story you told me last night.”
“Which one?”
“Hold that thought,” Olivia said as she held out her arms. Tanner walked over with a squirming, fussy pup who was desperately trying to get out of his grasp.
“I don’t know what’s gotten into him,” Tanner said as he handed off the infant.
“He just wants his momma,” Olivia replied. But it wasn’t Olivia he wanted. As soon as she pulled him into her arms, he launched himself at Adora. She caught him and laughed.
“This happens all the time,” she explained to the room at large. “Babes always react this way when they are in the vicinity of a Cupid.” Little Austin settled himself into her lap and with a contented sigh, laid his head against her breast and stuck his thumb into his mouth.
She glanced up and saw Matt watching her with a peculiar look on his face. His eyes were glowing faintly, a sign, she knew from her studies, that his emotions were heightened. She wondered what it meant. Was the image of her, with a child in her lap, making him realize that maybe he did want to take a mate after all? She hoped so. The idea of losing her wings frightened her far more than she was willing to admit, even to herself.
“Why do you think that is?” Rachel wondered as she stroked the babe’s downy hair.
Adora shifted her focus from Matt to Rachel and Olivia and explained in low tones, even though she’d read in her shifter manual that they all had enhanced hearing and could probably hear everything she said anyway.
“We let off this…aura or scent, or some call it pheromones. It’s supposed to help us encourage our assignments to find their true love. With babes, it just makes them adore us. I’ve never come into contact with a non-Cupid babe that did not react this exact same way.”
Josh snorted. “Maybe you and Rachel can start that daycare together. If all the pups act like that one, the parents won’t be able to say no.”
Matt arched his brows, and she knew it was a silent challenge, but she ignored him.
Tanner laughed and tipped back the last of the whiskey in his glass. “Good luck with your assignment, Adora. I couldn’t imagine any woman wanting to spend the rest of her life shackled to this guy.” He delivered a punch to Matt’s shoulder.
“He’s not that bad,” Adora defended him. “He’s actually quite considerate and nice. He’ll make a wonderful mate. I just have to find the right girl.”
Tanner and Josh continued to rib Matt about his impending matrimonial status, while he argued against them.
“Oh, ignore them,” Rachel said, waving as if dismissing the three shifters. “Let’s talk strategy. Olivia and I will help you try to fix him up at the party.”
“Oh, no, you won’t,” Matt warned, breaking away from the teasing to focus on Adora and her new friends. “I’m out of here if you do.”
Adora frowned.
“You can stay. I don’t care. But I’m not sticking around if you three are going to try to mate me to every female who walks by.”
“Not every one,” Rachel said, and the three women dissolved into giggles.
*
They held true to Rachel’s words. The list she and Adora had drafted earlier that morning had apparently been short. He should have looked at it when he had the chance, so he would know what he was up against. The problem was, Adora was clearly an expert at this gig, and with Rachel and Olivia’s help, they were awfully damn stealthy.
An attractive female from his pack who was a few years older than him walked up and began chatting to him about the brewery Josh had purchased the year before, and Matt grew instantly suspicious. When the woman walked away, he stalked over to Adora and latched onto her arm.
“Knock it off. I’m not interested.”
“What are you talking about?”
“That woman,” he said, and he turned around to point. As he did so, he watched her walk up to a man with a swath of gray at his temples. She wound her arms around his chest from behind and kissed the back of his ear.
“I never try to arrange something between my assignments and someone who is already in a relationship,” Adora told him. “And as I understand it, shifters mate for life. If she was meant to be your true love, it’s too late now. We have to go with plan B.”
“What’s plan B?”
“I have no idea. Yet. I’ll let you know when we see her.” And with an impish smile, she bounced away, barely refraining from flying. He could tell. The wings made a brief appearance before she checked herself and hid them from view again. He understood how she felt. He too wanted to shift into a different form and run free, away from the constraints of civilized society for a while.
But he couldn’t. He had to schmooze his fellow pack members, and work at convincing them that Rachel was a worthy pack master’s mate, and that Josh was justified in using pack money to support his favorite human interest causes.
Resolutely, he joined a conversation in progress and set out to do just that. It was a small gathering of shifters he knew fairly well, as they were all about the same age, and he’d gone to school with most of them. They were discussing Rachel when he walked up.
“Don’t stop on my behalf,” he said mildly, as he tipped his beer bottle to his lips.
The lone female in the group sneered. “Right, Matt. You’re Josh’s cousin. We know how tight you two are.”
“True. So ask away. What do you want to know about his mate? I’m an open book. I’ll tell you anything.”
“Even about their sex life?” Oscar asked.
“I don’t know how much I can tell you about that, since they don’t make it a habit of asking me to join them. But if you’re wondering if they do have sex, yes, I’m pretty sure they do.”
“I bet she tricked him into doing it shifter style, so he’d be forced to mate with her,” Laurie said.
“Considering she had no earthly idea what it meant to have sex shifter style at the time, I highly doubt it,” Matt replied.
“It just doesn’t seem right,” Sal complained. By the bleary look in his eyes, he had already tipped the scale into wasted territory. “The pack master and a human. What does she have that a female shifter doesn’t?”
Matt took another pull from his beer and shrugged. “I don’t quite think it happened that way. It wasn’t a conscious decision. They just fell in love. Yes, it would have been easier if she’d been a shifter, but she isn’t. And Josh is happy, she’s accepted our existence and her role as his mate, and we have to figure out a way to live with it.”
“Brilliantly said,” Adora said approvingly, as she walked up to stand next to him.
Four shifter gazes locked onto her.
“Jesus, you’re small,” Laurie said. “What are you?”
“She’s hot.” Oscar leered her breasts.
Matt thrust out his arm and slammed his palm into Oscar’s chest, sending him stumbling backwards. He glanced at Adora. “You aren’t going to puke, are you?”
She swallowed and shook her head. “No, I’m okay.”
Laurie leaned close and sniffed. “You kind of smell like sex.”
“Desire, actually,” Adora corrected her. “And love.”
“What does love smell like?”
Adora shrugged. “Me, I guess.”
Matt thought about when he’d first captured her, and they’d ended up on the ground, with him straddling her hips, while she lay on her back. He’d been turned on despite the fact that she wasn’t exactly his type. Was that why? Because of her scent?
Laurie eyed each of the three males in the group. “It sort of turns me on,” she admitted to the group at large. Matt was annoyed when Adora gave him a hopeful look.
“Really? You think some woman who just announces to a group of guys that she wants to get laid is my future mate?”
“Good point,” she admitted. “Besides, I really think she and Oscar are better for one another.”
As if to prove her point, Oscar reached over and cupped the back of Laurie’s neck, and leaned close to whisper something in her ear. In very short order, they slipped away from the group. Matt watched them leave.
“I suppose, even if it isn’t forever, it’s definitely for tonight.”
“Sometimes, that can turn into forever. I’ve helped numerous couples who thought they only wanted one night, and are blissfully happy together nearly ten years later.”
“How old are you Cupids when you start getting assigned to finding mates for people?”
“We start Cupid School when we are fifteen, and most have their first assignments when they are twenty.”
“So how old are you?”
“That isn’t a question a lady should answer,” was Adora’s tart reply.
He laughed. “Okay, fine. How long have you been hooking people up?”
She gave him a knowing smile. “Nearly ten years.”
“You said you were Level One. What does that mean? How many levels are there?”
Her face darkened as if a cloud just covered the moon. Whatever he said, it hadn’t been the right thing. “There are four levels, and then, if you are good enough, you get asked to become an Assigner.”
“It must be damn hard to move up a level, if you’re still a Level One.”
“I was once a Level Four.”
Matt gave her a surprised look. “What happened?”
Adora turned away and for a few moments, looked everywhere but at him. The third member of their group had wandered away by this point, and they were momentarily alone. He touched her arm.
“What happened?” he asked again.
She sighed. “I was demoted. I made a rather…large mistake. And my heart hasn’t quite been in my assignments since. I truly am on my last leg here.”
“Was it your fault? The demotion, I mean.”
She sipped from her wine glass and fidgeted with the scarf draped around her neck. “I suppose yes is the correct answer. I made several poor decisions that interfered with my assignment actually sealing the deal with his true love.”
“Why?”
She pursed her lips. “I don’t want to talk about this.”
“Why?” he asked again, ignoring her comment.
“I said—”
He cut her off. “I’m not going to let it go. Remember, I’m an animal by nature. Very tenacious. You might as well tell me. It might garner sympathy. Maybe I’ll even let you find me a mate.”
She gave him a startled look, clearly shocked by his flip comment. He drained the last of his beer and placed it on the tray of a passing server, and grabbed a full one.
“Let’s just say I’m starting to like you. And that makes me sympathetic to your cause. And being around all these other shifters who are happy in their relationships…” He waved at the room at large with his beer bottle. “Maybe it’s not such a bad thing. As long as it’s a love match,” he warned her.
She beamed and grabbed his arm and squeezed. “Truly? You’re going to let me find you a mate? You won’t fight me anymore?” She looked delighted, as if she were a child and he’d just promised her a double dipped ice cream cone.
“I’ll still fight you, but let’s just say I’m resigned to the fact that it’s probably going to happen. I’d feel like shit if you lose your wings because of me. I think it’s pretty cool that you can fly. Maybe tomorrow we can go flying together. I can shift into a hawk or eagle or something.”
Her smile widened. “That sounds fabulous. I love flying.”
“Well, now you’re so damn happy that I feel bad asking what went wrong.” He waved his beer bottle at the crowd again. “So I guess you should focus on your task. Tell me: Who’s on that list? I get first rights of refusal, right?”
“Of course.” She snapped her fingers and the tightly rolled scroll appeared in her hand. As she opened it, she said, “Let’s get to work, shall we?”
*
He told her she had good taste in women. To some women, that might seem like a strange comment. Offensive, even. But to Adora, it was one of the highest compliments she could receive. It meant she was damn good at her job. It meant she might not be stuck at a Level One for much longer.
Hopefully, she’d gotten her groove back. Finding a mate for a shifter would certainly help. Most Cupids shied away from the task of matching shifters. As much as they were pack-like creatures with an inborn desire to mate, generally, by the time they were assigned a Cupid, shifters were almost beyond help. Helping Matt find love was bound to move her up a level—maybe even two. Level Three. It’d been a while since she’d been at a Level Three. The assignments were more prime at Level Three. And she’d have a better shot at avoiding the Procreation Chamber if she was a Level Three.
She felt both flattered and guilty that he decided to accept the fact that he needed a mate just to keep her from losing her wings. Such a truly wonderful guy. Whoever she matched him with was a damn lucky female. Adora was determined that whoever it was, she would be perfect for Matt. He deserved no less. She would make sure he spent the rest of his days happy with his life partner—and glad for Adora, for helping him find her.
At the moment, he was across the room, chatting up a lovely female from Adora’s list. Things were going well, she judged, by the way he leaned into her, and the way she giggled and lightly touched the front of his shirt when he spoke.
She had a momentary flash of herself in that very same position, with Matt standing over her, leaning in suggestively, as if he were having a difficult time keeping himself from kissing her. What would she do in that position? Would she turn her face up, and silently offer her lips for kissing? Or would she play coy and look at him through her lashes, smiling prettily and giving him just enough to keep him trying for more?
Did it really matter what she would do? It wasn’t her in that particular position, and she needed to stop thinking such thoughts, unless she wanted to find herself in trouble again. Only this time, she would lose her wings over it.
Olivia wandered over and joined Matt’s conversation, and in the space of one heartbeat and the next, the dynamics changed. The woman said something to Olivia. Olivia looked offended, put out, possibly frightened. Matt snarled something into the woman’s face, and she cowered under the strength of his words. And then Matt grabbed Olivia’s arm and dragged her away from the offending female.
A moment later, he hovered over Adora, invading her space, stabbing his finger at her chest.
“You need to be a little more thorough in your research, Cupid,” he snapped.
Adora blinked up at him, forcing herself not to cower. Matt wouldn’t hurt her. She didn’t know why, but she was absolutely certain of that fact. But damn, he was scary like this.
“That woman over there just threatened to eat Olivia,” he added, answering her unspoken question.
“Oh.” Adora clapped her hand over her mouth and fought the wave of nausea threatening her far-too-sensitive stomach. “I had no idea.”
Matt blew out a frustrated sigh and backed off. “Don’t puke, Adora. Come on. Work through it.”
And there he was, being considerate for her stupid propensity for becoming nauseous whenever there was the slightest potential for violence.
She took several deep breaths and then finally said, “Okay, I’m fine now.”
Matt ran his hand through his hair, sending it into disarray. Bed head. She tried to force the image out of her head.
“You okay, Olivia?” he asked, glancing at the Lightbearer standing with them.
“Yes, I’m fine,” she replied, and then Tanner was there, towering over the women and glaring at Matt.
“What happened to my mate?” he snapped, irritated already, even though he didn’t have the faintest idea what just transpired.
“I’m fine, Tanner,” Olivia said, and she melted into his arms, wrapping her arm around his waist and holding on too tightly to prove her words true.
“You were frightened. I could feel it.”
“I know. But Matt was there and everything is fine now.”
Adora could tell that Olivia did not want to bring the situation to her mate’s attention, but Matt was either oblivious or didn’t really care what Olivia wanted.
“She was just threatened. By one of my pack.”
Tanner’s overprotective stance went into overdrive, as he wrapped his arm around Olivia and pulled her over to his other side, so that she was tucked between he and Matt. He scanned the room, searching for signs of danger.
“She was drunk,” Matt explained. “And I’m pretty sure she thought she was being funny. Obviously it wasn’t.”
“No, not by a long shot. And especially not right now.”
Matt gave him an inquisitive look and Tanner blew out a frustrated breath.
“I wasn’t going to say anything…” Tanner continued to scan the room as he let his words trail away for a moment.
“The reason Finn didn’t come with us is because I wanted someone to stay behind and watch over the coterie while we’re here. Olivia’s father agreed with me.”
“Have there been threats?” Matt’s arm automatically slid up Adora’s back and cupped her neck. Curiously, that small connection helped keep the nausea at bay.
“No, not yet. But Finn and his brother Reid have noticed a lot of shifter scents near the coterie lately. Scents that don’t belong to any of the shifters currently living in the coterie. Given our history with Lightbearers, we’re all a little on edge.”
“There’s a small pack over on that side of the state. South of the coterie, but it’s not unreasonable that they would wander up that way on occasion,” Matt said.
“I’m aware of that pack. They tend to keep to themselves, have never sniffed around the area before, and Sander says they’ve been there almost as long as the Lightbearers have. The problem now is that we’ve had to change the wards around the coterie. They used to repel shifters. But now that there are shifters living inside, that’s not exactly conducive to us coming and going as we please.”
“My father says the faery queen will likely be able to create a new ward that will somehow allow the residents of the coterie to enter and exit without issue, but still keep it hidden from humans and all other shifters,” Olivia added.
“That sounds like a plan,” Matt said.
Olivia glanced at Tanner. “Except the faery queen has been tied up with some sort of upheaval in the Land of the Fae, and hasn’t given my father the time of day when he’s called on her.”
“So for now, we’ve beefed up security and my nerves are shot,” Tanner said, draining the glass of amber liquid in his hand.
“I want to go check on our pup. I know you trust this youngling who is watching him, but I have a strong urge to be an overprotective sire at the moment. If you’ll excuse us.” He nodded to them each in turn and then he and Olivia hurried away, heading for the main staircase to slip upstairs. Adora doubted they would make another appearance again. Neither would be comfortable leaving their child so soon given what just happened to Olivia and their worry for the safety of the residents of the coterie.
“I’m impressed,” Matt said after they left. “I honestly thought my shoes would be ruined by now.”
“If you hadn’t been massaging my neck, I’m sure they would have.”
He grinned. “My pleasure. Let me know anytime you’re feeling nauseous. I’ll be sure to rush right over and be your personal masseuse.”
The images flashing through Adora’s mind had nothing whatsoever with being nauseous, and everything to do with massages. She flushed and took a step away, encouraging him to drop his arm.
“Hey there, big guy.”
Matt turned around and both he and Adora watched as Shay walked toward them on a pair of sexy high-heeled knee boots. She offered him one of the drinks in her hand.
“Sorry, I didn’t bring another,” she said to Adora. “I’m Shay, by the way.” She offered her hand.
Adora shook it. “Adora. Nice to meet you.”
Shay cocked her head to one side and studied the other woman. “I’ve met a Lightbearer and a human, so I know what they look and smell like. But you…you’re different.”
Adora nodded. “I’m a Cupid.”
Shay’s gaze cut to Matt. “Cupid? As in pups with wings and bows and arrows?”
Matt tried unsuccessfully to hide his lip twitch while Adora managed fairly successfully to hide her sigh of annoyance.
“Not quite. Yes, we are matchmakers as the legends suggest. But we do not actually start matchmaking until our twentieth year, after we’ve completed Cupid School. And no one uses bows and arrows anymore.”
Shay studied her as if she were a specimen under a microscope. “Fascinating. And what is a Cupid doing at a shifter shindig?”
Adora cleared her throat. “I’m, ah, Matt’s Cupid.”
Shay’s eyes widened. “You’re playing matchmaker for this guy?” Her gaze roved over him in a proprietary manner that Adora hated instantly. “Got any takers yet?”
“A short list,” Adora said curtly.
Shay turned toward Matt, effectively putting her body between him and Adora. “Hey, listen, this morning it sort of felt like, I don’t know, like there was something. And then you turned all cold on me. I was wondering what I did to offend you?”
Adora watched as Matt sifted through the memories in his head, trying to recall the conversation with this woman.
“He’s worried you’re interested because of his status within his pack,” Adora supplied helpfully. Whether she was trying to discourage or encourage Matt wasn’t entirely clear, especially when he scowled at her for bringing it up.
Shay’s eyes widened in understanding and denial. “That’s so not true,” she insisted. “I mean, I guess I was impressed that you’re the pack master’s cousin, but that’s it. I don’t care about status. In fact, I prefer to fly under the radar.”
As the woman did her best to convince Matt her intentions were pure—or at least that they were not connected to his status as Josh’s cousin—Adora watched as Matt slowly came around and decided to believe her. Within short order, they were engaged in a conversation about something specific to being shifters, and Adora had become a third wheel. She reminded herself that was the way it was supposed to be, as she quietly slipped away. And she wondered why she did not feel better about the situation.
Matt was clearly exhibiting signs of being interested in the woman. He’d already informed her that he was finally willing to find a mate, so she could complete her assignment and keep her wings. This was the most viable potential mate so far.
Why did that bother Adora so?